Can microfinance-backedentrepreneurship be a holisticempowerment tool for women?

Empirical evidence from KashmirValley, IndiaShagufta Tariq Khan

Department of Accounting, Jazan University, Jazan, Saudi Arabia

Mohd Abass BhatBusiness Studies Department, University of Technology and Applied Sciences,

Muscat, Oman, and

Mohi-Ud-Din SangmiDepartment of Commerce, University of Kashmir, Srinagar, India

Abstract

Purpose –This study investigates the effectiveness ofmicrofinance-backed entrepreneurship as amechanismfor the holistic empowerment of women.Design/methodology/approach –This study employs amixed-method research-design consisting of quasi-experimental design (quantitative approach) involving women, both entrepreneurs (132) and non-entrepreneurs (238), as well as in-depth semi-structured interviews (qualitative approach).Findings –Quantitative analysis revealed that female entrepreneurs are better off than female non-entrepreneursin terms of economic, social, political and psychological indicators of empowerment. However, relatively lesserimpact was found in terms of political, and to an even smaller extent, social empowerment of women. Analysis ofin-depth interviews corroborated these findings confirming that entrepreneurship serves as an effective tool for theholistic empowerment of women. However, non-entrepreneurs also exhibit social empowerment.Research limitations/implications –Given the restricted geographical ambit of the study, prudence oughtto be exercised in drawing inferences applied to alternate contexts. That the vast majority of questionnairerespondents are illiterate presented a notable impediment in the process of collection of accurate responses.Practical implications – Microfinance intervention ought to be specifically directed to cultivatingentrepreneurship among women; in particular, to achieve the full benefits of empowerment, women availingmicrofinance ought to exert full control over their own business ventures.Originality/value – In analyzing holistic empowerment through microfinance supported businesses set upby women, the study adds to the existing literature on women entrepreneurship and empowerment.

Keywords Economic empowerment, Social empowerment, Psychological empowerment, Political

empowerment, Women’s entrepreneurship

Paper type Research paper

IntroductionAcross the globe, as a result of a variety of factors women are more likely to be poorer thanmen deprived of pre-natal and post-partum health care curtailed in terms of access to clean

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© Shagufta Tariq Khan, Mohd Abass Bhat and Mohi-Ud-Din Sangmi. Published in Journal of Businessand Socio-economic Development. Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is publishedunder the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute,translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes),subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may beseen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode.

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:

https://www.emerald.com/insight/2635-1374.htm

Received 9 July 2021Revised 12 August 2021

9 October 20214 December 202111 December 2021

Accepted 12 December 2021

Journal of Business and Socio-economic Development

Emerald Publishing Limited2635-1374

DOI 10.1108/JBSED-07-2021-0097

water and sanitation afflicted by sexually transmitted diseases, subjected to all forms ofviolence, forced into early marriages, bereft of educational opportunities. Women are ineffect sound-class citizens whose household chores and child rearing activities gouncompensated yet expose them to high levels of indoor pollution due to gender division oflabor. Women even die more often than men because of natural disasters (United Nations,2015). Not surprisingly, women are under-represented in power and decision-making bothin public as well as private spheres (Rubin et al., 2021). With the advent of globalizationand trade liberalization, women living in extreme poverty not only have largely beenneglected in social policies instituted by governments but, simultaneously have beenenduring blatant discrimination at the hands of MNCs (multi-national corporations),which exploit women by imposing on them low wages. Lack of education and vocationalskills combined with social repression of women in male-dominated societies that erectimpenetrable glass ceilings stymieing the ability of women to move forward, drivespoverty among women forcing women to accept meager wages in the face of scantemployment opportunities to move forward (Adeosum and Owolabi, 2021; Gallo-Cruz,2021). India is a well-known example where women beset by these limitations face thebrunt of poverty (Besley and Burgess, 2003). Women, when attempting to set up smallbusinesses, are hamstrung by credit constraints established by actors who regardhousehold chores as being the primary responsibility of women (Madichie and Nkamnehe,2010; Shoma, 2019). Addressing the issue of “feminization of poverty” requires feminizingimportant anti-poverty initiatives – such as microfinance programs (Chant, 2014).Microfinance strengthens financial inclusion by providing weaker strata of society thecapacity to harness economic opportunities by ensuring access to financial services with aview to eradicating poverty by raising standards of living (Suprabha, 2014; Kumar, 2017;Khan et al., 2020). Microfinance basically refers to the provision of loans, savings,insurance, transfer services and other financial products of small denomination targetedat low-income clients (Khandelwal, 2007). Microfinance provides economic opportunitiesin the form of micro-entrepreneurship or self-employment options to women serving toraise their standard of living (Muhammad et al., 2012; Tariq and Sangmi, 2019; Tariq, 2020;Tariq et al., 2020). More importantly, compared to alternative employment options, self-employment in micro-enterprises significantly buoys the economic empowerment ofwomen (Senapati and Ojha, 2019). In addition, self-employment options are more likely toovercome the cultural, racial, class and gender-based obstacles that stymie theadvancement of low-income women incumbent in traditional jobs. Self-employmentcontributes significantly to the advancement of women in terms of power, wealth andstatus. Being self-employed enables women to shed the shackles of collective male controlimposed by male-constructed and biased social welfare systems. Women gainemancipation from the home (in which wages go uncompensated) and from the male-dominated or MNC-dominated) work-places (where wages are marginalized at subsistencelevels) (Alkhaled and Berglund, 2018; Vujko et al., 2019). Moreover, income generation andsavings attributable to access to microfinance raises the bargaining power of women inrelation to men in households (Swain and Wallentin, 2012; Ghosh and Neogi, 2017).

Women have largely become the primary target group of microfinance programs forreasons of repayment performance and family welfare (Isserles, 2003). With respect to thecontribution of women to household consumption, sharp improvement in income andsavings, concomitant with a significant decline in poverty, is manifested in householdswhere women avail microfinance as seed money to initiate sustainable entrepreneurialactivities (Sinha et al., 2012). Moreover, utilizing women in productive activities isanticipated to achieve the twin goals of gender equality and women empowermentcontemplated “Sustainable Development Goals” (to be achieved by 2030) promulgated bythe United Nations in 2015. In view of the manifest benefits stemming from microfinance,

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initiatives that channel women into entrepreneurial activities are warranted (Ardrey et al.,2006). Empowering women, in this capacity, would not only serve as a catalyst forsustainable economic development but also induce gender inequality (Duflo, 2012).Indubitably, empowerment is a complex multi-faceted process that involves differentspheres of social and cultural, health, economic, legal, political, psychological, naturalresources and spiritual (Malhotra and Schuler, 2005; Hennink et al., 2012). The existingliterature supports the contention that entrepreneurship leads to the achievement of thegoal of empowerment. However, consensus with respect to domains of empowerment as aresult of entrepreneurship among women has not been achieved and the issue meritsfurther examination (Chaterjee et al., 2018). To this end, this study provides empiricalevidence to examine entrepreneurship undertaken by women as a holistic empowermenttool with a view to contributing to the existing literature on both entrepreneurship andempowerment of women. The word “Empowerment” has been defined variedly byvarious researchers. Empowerment is a process of enabling rather than delegating, whichimplies strengthening conditions responsible for removing the feelings of powerlessness(Conger and Kanungo, 1988). According to Kabeer (1999), empowerment is the process ofexpansion in people’s ability to make strategic/first order choices (the choices that arecritical for people to live the lives they want e.g. whom to marry, whether to have achildren) that help to make second-order choices which may be important for improvingthe quality of life, in a context where such an ability was previously denied to them. In thisstudy, which employs a mixed-method research design, empowerment is conceptualizedas a multi-dimensional construct involving economic, social, political and psychologicaldimensions fostered through entrepreneurship. To this end, empowerment is defined as aprocess of change by which individuals or groups (in this case rural women) with limitedchoice, freedom and power are enabled to gain and leverage power that enhances theirability to exercise choice and freedom in ways that positively contribute to their well-being (Kabeer, 1999; Malhotra and Schuler, 2005; Hennink et al., 2012; Ganle et al., 2015).

Review of the literatureThrough micro-credit, poor women primarily are empowered to engage in necessity-driven entrepreneurship as a means to ensure the survival and support their families.Female entrepreneurship entails somebody (women) who set up a new business venture(new income generating activity/micro-enterprise) or expanding an already establishedcommercial venture engaged in the production and sale of goods or services (registered orunregistered). For the purpose of this study, woman entrepreneur is one who starts a newor invests in pre-existing micro-enterprise (Mahmood, 2011; Mahmood et al., 2014). Womenengage in variety of micro-entrepreneurial activities spanning retail business and services,manufacturing and wholesale merchandise but with particular intensity in products andservices linked to home-based enterprises involving not only foodstuff including baking,raising of poultry and livestock, cultivation and supplying of fruits and vegetables, sweetdish preparation, rice trading but also handicraft/textile production complemented by adiverse array of services (including hairdressing, education, tailoring, retail, leasing,telephony). Women in such micro-types of enterprises generally employ 0–5 employeeseither from their households or outside (Nguyen et al., 2014; Mahmood et al., 2014; Belwalet al., 2012; Ghosh and Bhandari, 2014). Across the literature, some evidence obtainsestablishing a linkage between entrepreneurship and exiguous domains of empowerment(Panta and Thapa, 2017; Zgheib, 2018; Xheneti et al., 2019; Kumari, 2020). On a holisticlevel, however, empowerment of women through entrepreneurship appears scant (Tariqand Sangmi, 2018).

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Entrepreneurship and women’s economic empowermentEconomic empowerment reflects access to and control over economic resources: sources ofincome as well as property and assets, like savings and investments. Economicempowerment begets social, political and psychological empowerment. In terms of linkageto entrepreneurship, most of the researchers impart exclusive emphasis on the economicdimension while overlooking other crucial domains of empowerment. Buvinic and Furst-Nichols (2016) and Zgheib (2018) concluded that the potential to empower low-income womeneconomically through engagement in self-employment has a great potential to facilitate lo-income women’s economic empowerment compared to all exceeds that imparted by otheremployment options. Economic independence motivates women to start their own businessventures; they usually operate from home and often run unregistered (Ademokun and Ajayi,2012). Ganle et al. (2015) and Kapoor (2019) revealed those women who engage themselves insome business in which they exercise full control over their loans enjoy economicempowerment. In contrast, thosewomenwho, instead of starting a business, use loans to fundhousehold consumption, or who exercise no control or weak discipline over repaymentobligations, become further mired in poverty as well as in disempowerment. Moreover,extension of microfinance credit to women who managed their own enterprises enjoyed alevel of empowerment in excess of those women delegated managerial authority to malemembers in the households (Khan and Noreen, 2012). In this vein, women hotel/homestayentrepreneurs in Nepal, able to take part in decisions in the household particularly related tofinancial matters or expenditures, realized increased contributions to family income incontrast to those exerting less managerial autonomy (Lucy et al., 2008; Panta and Thapa,2017). A study of 43 displaced\migrant Palestinian women operating home-based enterprises(embroidered goods) reported increases in income, savings and expenditures. Nonetheless,none of the women had established formal and legally recognized enterprises for a period often years; rather, they were contented to maintain home-based enterprises which they foundculturally acceptable (Al-Dajani and Marlow, 2013). With specific reference to rural India, itwas found that upon accessingmicro-credit andmobilizing savings, female entrepreneurs areengaged in a variety of micro-enterprises consisting of activities involving production ofbasic articles (incense sticks, paper plates, broom sticks and bangles) and comestibles(pickles, fritters and snacks), as well as agriculture. Undertaking these micro-entrepreneurialactivities led to appreciable improvement in economic conditions of women (Poornima, 2013).Earlier, Lucy et al. (2008) likewise found that female entrepreneurs who invested their micro-credit loans in their own business generated a stable source of income enabling them toprovide financial support to family well above subsistence levels. In this vein, Maru andChemjor (2013) asserted that microfinance enables female entrepreneurs to generate income,assets and savings well in excess of that which would have obtained in its absence or had itbeen squandered on consumption and, in addition, microfinance reallocates decision-makingpower to the female entrepreneurs in households.

Of significant note, moreover, participation of women in self-help groups (SHGs) notonly engenders benefit amongst the members directly themselves from increased personalpecuniary betterment (Srinivas, 2015) but stimulates employment creation for otherwomen as well. As a result, the standard of living among women is raised (Mathur, 2017).A study of 600 bank-linked women SHGs confirms the constructive role played by SHGs infostering entrepreneurship among women by involving members in a variety of micro-enterprises through which income, savings and assets of female entrepreneurs increasedover time. Likewise, Kumar et al. (2021) found evidence that SHG participation cansubstantially raise the standard of living and economic status, as well as the level ofautonomy in decision-making of women in households. Versa (2015) corroborates the roleof female entrepreneurship in promoting the economic empowerment of women. However,he recognized dearth in empirical studies for this connection. In contrast to the more

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circumspect Ghosh and Neogi (2017) observed improved productivity stemming fromaccess to microfinance.

H1. Microfinance-backed entrepreneurship has a positive impact on women’s economicempowerment.

Entrepreneurship and women’s social empowermentSocial empowerment involves, on the individual and collective level, a “process of developinga sense of autonomy and self-confidence (serving) to change social relationships and theinstitutions and discourses that exclude poor people and keep them in poverty” (https://gsdrc.org/topic-guides/voice-empowerment-and-accountability/supplements/social-and-economic-empowerment/). Independence and social mobility are touchstones of social empowerment onthe individual level. Entrepreneurship is posited as a mechanism to stimulate the socialempowerment of women; however, insufficient evidence exists to impart full confidence tothat supposition. Janaki (2014) found, while comparing 184 women micro-entrepreneurs with188 passive beneficiaries of microfinance, women entrepreneurs are socially moreempowered than non-entrepreneurs. In the milieu in which women operating home-basedenterprises (embroidered goods), Xheneti et al. (2019) observed that women in patriarchalsocieties gain from entrepreneurship not only independence, both in the home and at thework-place, from male dominance but also an outlet to escape from collective male control ofthe social welfare system. Accessing microfinance through SHG participation cansubstantially result in raising women’s standard of living, status and decision-making inhouseholds that they were previously denied (Kumar et al., 2021). From investigationsundertaken by Shingla and Singh (2015) and Song and Li (2021) to determine the extent towhich entrepreneurship can empower women, it was found ex poste relative to ex anteinitiation of entrepreneurial activities, the status of women in the family and social mobility ofwomen significantly rose. In particular, Kumar et al. (2021) underscored that suchamelioration in economic and social status obtains to an even greater extent when womenaccess microfinance though participation in SHGs. In a survey of bank -linked SHGs, it wasdetermined that decision-making capacity, and communication skills of, and awarenessevinced by female participants ratchets upwards upon initiation of entrepreneurial activities(Parmanandan and Packirisamy, 2015). Another survey of 397 SHG based womenentrepreneurs of West Bengal availing microfinance-backed enterprises corroborated thesefindings (Ghosh and Neogi, 2017). However, the above-mentioned studies characteristicallyfailed to articulate valid metrics to gage social empowerment.

H2. Microfinance-backed entrepreneurship significantly has a positive impact on socialempowerment of women.

Entrepreneurship and women’s political empowermentPolitical empowerment entails “a process of transferring various elements of power (neededto govern) to those who do not have it. Political empowerment requires inclusion indemocratic decision-making processes” (https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007%2F978-94-007-0753-5_2196), at a minimum involving participation in politicalactivities. Evidence regarding the role of entrepreneurship in political empowerment ofwomen, is tenuous with only an exiguous outcropping of studies positing such linkage. Lucyet al. (2008) parenthetically observed that female entrepreneurs exhibit a significantly higherpropensity to vote than female non-entrepreneurs. In this vein, Nayak (2018) reported thatwomen participating in SHGs are actively involved in political activities as well as exhibit ahigh level of activity in and an acute awareness of politics stemming from theirentrepreneurial experience (Nayak, 2018). According to Kumar et al. (2019), SHG members

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are more likely to have voted in an election than non-SHG members. For, they have becomeaccustomed to acting on their own initiative.

H3. Microfinance-backed women entrepreneurship has a positive impact on theirpolitical empowerment.

Entrepreneurship and the psychological/personal empowerment of womenPsychological/personal empowerment focuses on the internal strength of an individual withindicative characteristics being: self-confidence, self-reliance, self-esteem in the absence ofpsychological distress. Psychological/personal empowerment challenges gender norms.Safari et al. (2010) and Okyireh and Kwabena (2016) have expounded extensively on theconnection between psychological empowerment and entrepreneurship. In case of WestBengalese female entrepreneurs participating in SHGs, Ghosh and Neogi (2017) observedthat, as a result of their management of microfinance-backed enterprises, women reportincreasing levels of self-confidence. From observations made in the course of in-depthinterviews and focus group discussions with women engaged in homestay enterprises, Pantaand Thapa (2017) likewise recorded increasing levels of self-confidence evinced by femaleentrepreneurs, who confidently expressed their opinions in exchanges with others, includingcustomers, be they male strangers or female, acquaintance or stranger. Sengar et al. (2020)even maintains that women who start own enterprises evince improvement in personality bymanifesting self-confidence as well as sense of self-worth. Sidhu and Kaur (2006) and Kumari(2020) corroborate these findings.

H4. Microfinance-backed women entrepreneurship has a positive impact on theirpsychological/personal empowerment.

From this brief survey of the literature, it is manifest that researchers have focused almostexclusively on the economic empowerment of women through entrepreneurship is themostly linked and examined domain in relation to the phenomenon of entrepreneurship.Social empowerment, political empowerment and psychological/personal empowermenthave largely been crowded out by economic empowerment. Accordingly, very little isknown about the extent to which female entrepreneurship buoys the social, political andpsychological/personal empowerment of women. This multi-dimensional nature ofempowerment has largely been ignored in the literature and thus a major research gapexists rendering it impossible to ascertain whether female entrepreneurship can beaccurately designated as a holistic empowerment tool for women. The present study is aneffort to fill this void in the literature.

Research methodologyThe present study employs mixed-method research in which a quantitative approachinvolving a quasi-experimental design in which women entrepreneurs and women non-entrepreneurs, respectively, represent the treatment and control group. Another approach,qualitative, involves in-depth interviews conducted to gain richer insights from respondentsregarding the role of entrepreneurship in the holistic empowerment of women. Severalqualitative research tools such as focus group discussions, In-depth interviews, field notes,observation and case stories have been well utilized in good number of relevant studies(Ganle et al., 2015; Moyle et al., 2006; Kim et al., 2007; Kato and Kratzer, 2013).

This study espouses amulti-dimensional view of the empowerment of women. The impactof entrepreneurship on empowerment domains-economic, social, political and psychologicalare explicitly gaged as a highly context-specific phenomenon (consonant with the approachof Santillan et al., 2004; Schuler et al., 2010; Heckert and Fabic, 2013). In other words,

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empowerment indicators applied in one context may be irrelevant in other contexts. Thisstudy treats empowerment indicators as refinable on continuous basis given that, asSantillan et al. (2004) and Schuler et al. (2010) correctly point out the ways in whichempowerment is manifested may change overtime as social norms do change. Hence, thescale measuring factors are captured by exploratory factor analysis (EFA) as well asconfirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in the current study.

The research instrumentPrior to conducting the pilot survey and the exploratory interviews with the respondents,in line with operational constructs articulated in prior research on the subject-matter, asystematic framework for measuring women empowerment has been articulated based ondimension listed in Exhibit 1 (below). Variables capturing each dimension ofempowerment, along with the description of each of such dimension, also appear inExhibit 1 as follows:

Database and sample selectionThe quasi-experimental design engaged 132 female entrepreneurs and 238 non-entrepreneurs as a treatment and control group, respectively. In-depth interviews wereconducted with 50 respondents in each group of respondents. The study has been mainlyconducted in Kashmir Valley of Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir (India), and the datahave been collected from women SHG members registered under the program “NationalRural Livelihood Mission” through the administration of a structured interview schedule.The primary data used in this study are drawn from a larger study, previously conducted, forwhich data were collected in 2017. Quantitative data were analyzed using SPSS V20 andAMOS; whereas, qualitative data were analyzed using NVIVO.

Multi-stage random sampling has been employed in this study. At the initial stage, fourdistricts (Budgam, Ganderbal, Baramulla and Kupwara) out of total ten districts of Kashmirhave been selected purposively based on higher concentration of bank-linked SHGs andhighest cumulative sums of bank loans disbursed so far. In the second stage, four respectiveblocks have been selected from each district as these were the only blocks where SHGs werelinked to banks for the provision of basic financial services. At the third stage, blocks thathave been divided into six clusters each, three clusters have been chosen for the study on aconvenience basis and as permitted by the respective block program managers. In the finalstage, respondents have been selected randomly from all the chosen clusters. Finally, it waspossible to collect data from a sample of 370 respondents, though the required sample sizefollowingKrejcie andMorgan’s (1970) formulaswas 367 considering total population of 8,249.For the purpose of pre-testing of the instrument as well as development of multi-dimensionalscale of empowerment, a pilot survey of 100 respondents was conducted prior to final datacollection.

Tools of analysisIn order to examine impact of entrepreneurship on multiple domains of empowerment ofwomen understudy, an independent samples test was mainly used to find significance of thedifferences between two independent groups-women entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs.Data across groups were found approximately normally distributed with skewness andkurtosis values that were found generally lying between þ1 and �1. For data normalitychecks, researchers hold the viewpoint that a sample size of 300 should be considered largeand absolute skewness (>±2) and kurtosis (>±7) values should be used as reference valuesfor determining substantial non-normality (West et al., 1995; Kim, 2013).

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Development and validation of the scaleThe constructs “economic, political, social and psychological empowerment” have been welldeveloped using EFA based on pilot survey data collected from 100 respondents and CFAbased on final survey data consisting of total sample of 370 respondents. Based on pilotsurvey data and after eliminating problematic items (e.g., ill-treatment/abuse by husband/any

Dimension Description Item variables

Economicempowerment

Women’s ability to gain and control economicresources

� Income� Savings� Asset generation� Control over household income� Control over household savings� Control over purchasesReferences: Lokhande (2013), Jain andJain (2012), Moyle et al. (2006), Rehmanet al. (2015), Kato and Kratzer (2013),Khan and Noreen (2012), Kumar (2013),Ghosh and Neogi (2017)

Socialempowerment

Women’s ability to freely live lives outsidehome, interact with different people and enjoysocial status

� Visit to friends\relatives� Visit to market\bank\hospital� Ill-treatment from husband\male

member� Abuse by husband\in-laws� Respect\status� interaction in family\groups� interaction with officials\outsidersReferences: Weber and Ahmad (2014),Jain and Jain (2012), Rehman et al. (2015),Kato and Kratzer (2013), Pitt et al. (2006),Khan and Noreen (2012), Kumar (2021)

Politicalempowerment

Women’s ability to participate in politicalprocess\activities\meetings outside home andgain political awareness

� Voting practice� Participation in Panchayat

proceedings� Participation in election campaigns� Women’s reservation in Panchayat� Choice of candidate� Contest electionsReferences: Lokhande (2013), Jain andJain (2012), Habib and Jubb (2012),Rehman et al. (2015), Montgomery andWeiss (2011), Kumar et al. (2019)

Psychologicalempowerment

Capacity of women to increase their own self-reliance and internal strength

� Confidence to talk to children’steachers\outsiders

� Confidence to give opinion in family� Reducing feeling of loneliness� Reducing feeling of anxiety� Valuing self for working harder and

longer� Equity with husband\male memberReferences: Kim et al. (2007), Lokhande(2013), Moyle et al. (2006), Kato andKratzer (2013), Hansen (2015), Kumari(2020)

Source(s): Developed by the Authors

Exhibit 1.Empowermentdomains

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other household member) taking into account cross factor loadings, all the items under therespective four factors (economic, political, social and psychological) loaded satisfactorily(>0.50). The total variance explained by the four factors was 63.873% with an Eigen valuegreater than 1 (2.798). Reliability during EFA was assessed using Cronbach’s alpha and allthe factors performed satisfactorily on this test with economic empowerment (0.908), socialempowerment (0.767), political empowerment (0.797) and psychological empowerment(0.879). The scale of empowerment was further developed and validated using CFA. In thepresent study, CFA is preceded by an empirical base i.e. EFA performed on pilot survey data(Harrington, 2009; Field, 2009; Demirbag et al., 2006). Running the CFA in AMOS yieldedsatisfactory factor loadings i.e. greater than 0.70 except PE4post (0.524) and PsyE4post(0.494) whose loadings were unsatisfactory (<0.70) and thus both the manifest variables(Women’s Reservation in Panchayat (PE4post) and Reducing Feeling of Anxiety (PsyE4post)have been removed from the CFA model. In addition, a few error variances were correlatedbased on corresponding modification indices to improve the model fit. The modified CFAmodel is as follows (see Figure 1)

Figure 1.Confirmatory factor

analysis model

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AMOS output table yielded various model fit indices. The Chi-Square value is 349.214 with161 degrees of freedom and minimum discrepancy divided by degree of freedom (CMIN/DF)ratio of 2.169. The value of standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) is 0.0418 and rootmean square error of approximation (RMSEA) value is 0.056 with its corresponding PCLOSEvalue of 0.098. The goodness of fit index (GFI) is 0.918, comparative fit index (CFI) is 0.972 andTucker–Lewis index (TLI) is 0.967. All the model fit indices indicate good fit of the model.

Convergent and discriminant validity were also examined during CFA. According to Hairet al. (2010) convergent validity can better be assessed by examining factor loadings, averagevariance extracted (AVE) and composite reliability. All the items under respective factors hadsatisfactory factor loadings (>0.5 or ideally >0.7) consonant with evidence of convergentvalidity. AVE for all the constructs is above the threshold value of 0.50, meaning that all thelatent variables explain more than 50% of the overall variance. Composite reliability for allthe constructs is either close to 0.7 or greater than 0.7. Thus, the results incontrovertiblysubstantiate convergent validity. In CFA, discriminant validity is generally achieved bycomparing the average variances extracted with the squared correlation between twoconstructs and the validity is presumed good if the square root of average variance extracted(AVE) is greater than inter-construct correlations (Malhotra et al., 2006; Hair et al., 2010). Allthe square root of AVE computed values are greater than inter-construct correlations. Hence,the results provided sufficient evidence for discriminant validity.

Results and discussionSample characteristicsAmajority (238) of the respondents qualifies as non-entrepreneurs in this study (64.3%) andonly 35.7% (132) respondents identify themselves as entrepreneurs. One of the reasons for thelow percentage of entrepreneurs may be the intervention was started just four years ago.Women entrepreneurs have started various types of business ventures that include animalraising (e.g., dairy and livestock (15.1%), poultry (0.5%)), textiles and handicrafts (e.g.,embroidery (5.4%), carpet weaving (2.1%), decorative hemming (1.4%) and knitting (0.3%)),services (e.g., paddy-husking (8.0%), retail (3.5%) and tailoring (3.0%)) as well as agriculturaloutput and non-animal foodstuff production (e.g., vegetables (1.4%), walnuts (1.4%) andhoney (0.3%)). Female entrepreneurs generate employment ranging from 0 to 5 employeesrecruited from either frommembers of their household or from outsiders. However, amajorityof female entrepreneurs do not employ any workers in their micro-enterprises (15.7%) andmanage all their business affairs themselves. In contrast, 8.9% employ one worker, 5.4%employ two workers, 3.0% employ three workers, 1.4% employs four workers and 1.4%employs five workers in their business ventures. Irrespective of employment considerations,all the surveyedmicro-enterprises are unregistered and thus operate in the informal economy.

As far as the quantitative analysis is concerned, the impact of micro-financedentrepreneurship on empowerment has been examined involving two independent groups-women entrepreneurs andwomen non-entrepreneurs. Since the present analysis involves twogroups of respondents, data normality of dependent variables along the dimensions ofeconomic, social, political and psychological empowerment was checked group-wise withskewness and kurtosis that generally stood between �1 and þ1. Hence, data across groupscan be concluded to be approximately normally distributed.

It can be seen in the table below, the mean score for women entrepreneurs is positive andgreater than themean score for women non-entrepreneurs along with all variables associatedwith economic empowerment. These results imply a positive impact derived fromentrepreneurial activities by women in terms of economic empowerment. As can beobserved in Table 1, there are significant (p < 0.05) mean differences between femaleentrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs with respect to all the variables of economic

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empowerment. The higher and positive significant differences can be individually seen incase of independent income (r5 0.801), independent savings (r5 0.794) and asset generation(0.813). However, comparatively lower impact has been found in control over householdincome (r 5 0.669), control over household savings (r 5 0.640) and control over purchases(r 5 0.622). Comprehensively, in line with those of Kapoor (2019) and Zgheib (2018), theseresults suggest that entrepreneurship has a substantial impact on the economicempowerment of women (r 5 0.823). Likewise, Mathur (2017) observed thatentrepreneurship raises the standard of living of women engaged in micro-enterprisestart-ups.

Vis-�a-vis social empowerment variables, indicative of the positive impact ofentrepreneurship, mean scores for female entrepreneurs exceed that for female non-entrepreneurs with such results broadly aligningwith the findings of Xheneti et al. (2019) thatlink female entrepreneurship with the challenging of patriarchic gender norms. Results of theindependent sample test, presented in Table 1, confirm the significance of the differencesbetween those two groups with test statistic <0.05 for all the variables related to socialempowerment. However, that the magnitude of differences moderate at r < 0.30 for all thevariables suggests no substantial impact of entrepreneurship on the social empowerment of

VariableMean

difference TSig.

(2-Tailed)Effect size

(r)

Economic empowermentIndependent income �1.415 �23.055 0.000 0.801Independent savings �1.900 �24.546 0.000 0.794Asset generation �1.991 �26.587 0.000 0.813Control over household income �1.497 �17.279 0.000 0.669Control over household savings �1.168 �15.742 0.000 0.640Control over large purchases �1.220 �15.179 0.000 0.622Composite score �1.53178 27.697 0.000 0.823

Social empowermentVisit to friends\relatives �0.562 �5.700 0.000 0.285Visit to market\bank\hospital �0.565 �5.458 0.000 0.273Respect\status �0.510 �5.233 0.000 0.263Interaction in family\groups �0.503 �5.273 0.000 0.265Interaction with officials\outsiders �0.536 �5.662 0.000 0.283Composite score �0.53529 �6.197 0.000 0.308

Political empowermentVoting practice �0.964 �10.626 0.000 0.485Participation in panchayat proceedings �0.857 �9.423 0.000 0.441Participation in election campaigns �0.929 �10.299 0.000 0.474Choice of candidate �0.951 �10.800 0.000 0.494Composite score �0.92537 �11.833 0.000 0.531

Psychological empowermentConfidence to talk to children’steachers\outsiders

�1.021 �11.250 0.000 0.514

Confidence to give opinion in family �1.060 �11.777 0.000 0.533Reducing feeling of loneliness �1.141 �12.633 0.000 0.568Valuing self for working harder and longer �1.168 �12.866 0.000 0.568Equity with husband\male member �1.283 �14.500 0.000 0.623Composite score �1.13459 �14.526 0.000 0.611

Source(s): Authors’ calculations based on primary data

Table 1.Independent samples

test (womenempowerment)

The holisticempowerment

of women

women. These findings contrast with Song and Li (2021), who found that femaleentrepreneurs enjoy substantially better status in the family and level of social mobilitythan their non-entrepreneurial counterparts.

Similar results manifest with respect to political empowerment as indicated by respectivemean scores, for all applicable variables, shown in the table below indicative ofmean scores offemale non-entrepreneurs trailing those of female non-entrepreneurs to a statisticallysignificant level (p < 0.05). As with social empowerment, likewise, the magnitude of thedifferences is the modest with only a moderate level of impact (r < 0.50) in case of all thevariables of political empowerment. These results imply only a marginal link betweenentrepreneurial activity and political empowerment of women. Yet, previous studies havedocumented the active involvement of female entrepreneurs, at least those with SHGmembership, in political activities (Nayak, 2018). Kumar et al. (2019) noted that SHGmembersare more likely to vote independently of patriarchic influence than non-SHG-members. Inaddition, such SHG members are more active in Village Councils (Gram Sabhas) than non-members and exhibit greater confidence than do non-members that the VillageRepresentative House (the Gram Panchayat) will duly heed their suggestions takingaffirmative action in response to them.

With respect to impact of female entrepreneurship on variables related to thepsychological empowerment, evidence of a stronger nexus obtained. As depicted inTable 1, across all such variables, the differences between the two groups, femaleentrepreneurs and female non-entrepreneurs was found statistically significant (p< 0.05) but,unlike with respect to both social and political empowerment, the scale of the differencesbetween mean scores of variables analyzed by effect size (in which r > 0.50) indicates thatfemale entrepreneurship exerts a large impact on psychological empowerment of women.Such results align closely with the findings of Sengar et al. (2020), Sidhu and Kaur (2006) andKumari (2020), who observed improvement in terms of self-awareness, self-confidence andsense of achievement among women who availed of microfinance in establishing their ownenterprises.

The results of this study suggest an overall positive and significant impact ofmicrofinance-backed female entrepreneurship on the empowerment of women on a holisticlevel. However, the impact of microfinance-backed female entrepreneurship on economic andsocial empowerment transcends that on social and political empowerment.

Analysis of qualitative data in NVIVO gathered from in-depth semi-structured interviewscorroborates that microfinance-backed entrepreneurship serves as an effective tool enablingthe holistic empowerment of women. Women in entrepreneurship widely report ameliorationnot only of their standard of living (e.g. increased income and growth in savings as well asasset generation) but also of their psychological sense of well-being. In addition, women inentrepreneurship evince a propensity to actively engage politically to an extent significantlygreater than women engaged in economic activities outside of entrepreneurship whileactively engaging socially only to an extent marginally greater than the latter. Womenentrepreneurs reported substantial control over economic resources – a touchstone ofeconomic empowerment. As one of the respondent narrates “Being in the intervention taughtme a lot of skills and helped me develop my business mind.” Despite the fact that I havebrothers, my status has raised since I began earning money from my business and meetingmany household requirements, and my father treats me as if I were his son rather than adaughter.” In relation to social empowerment, female entrepreneurs attested to enhancementin social status and mobility and improved interaction with both family members andoutsiders with a diminution in reports of victimization though violence. It is clear from therespondent’s narration, “I used to buy only a few things for myself and my house. Also,despite the fact that I had a friendly relationship with my husband, I was not fully involved inall household decisions. However, since joining the program and earning a decent amount of

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money, I’ve bought a lot of things for myself, my children and the house. I now participate inall household matters because I am much more respected than before.” However, thesespecific findings have to be tempered with reports of female non-entrepreneurs who alsonoted uptick vis-�a-vis indicators of social empowerment. In terms of political empowerment,female entrepreneurs report control over voting activity independent of undue influenceexerted bymale familymembers.Many report participation in Village Representative Houses(Panchayats) and a few have contested elections as political candidates for office themselves.From qualitative analysis, evidence of political empowerment of female entrepreneurs isstronger than that obtained through quantitative analysis. As reported by one of therespondents, “prior to the business activity, I was never consulted about any matter at home,and I was treated as an unworthy family member.”Even though I was previously unaware ofPanchayats, I am now free to attend any public or Panchayat meeting. I can now go whereverI want. More importantly, I’ve been able to overcome my loneliness by freely meeting andinteracting with other members of the group.” In the course of semi-structured interviews,female entrepreneurs spoke with self-confidence and exuded a degree of self-esteemappreciable greater than female non-entrepreneurs, who reported psychological stress levelsof an order higher than that of the former. As narrated by one of the respondents, “Beinginvolved in the business venture has earned me respect, dignity and notoriety.” In mycommunity, I’ve established myself as a role model. I am frequently invited to speak atentrepreneurship events and to inspire other aspiring female entrepreneurs. I’ve gained theconfidence to speak in front of large groups of people. I also had the chance to meet andinteract with notable figures and officials.” In broad terms, microfinance-backedentrepreneurship among women, in line with conclusions reached by Sidhu and Kaur(2006), Basher (2007) and Upadhye (2012), can be regarded as catalyzing the holisticempowerment of women in the Kashmir Valley of India.

Conclusion and suggestionsIn this study, the impact of microfinance-backed entrepreneurial enterprises undertaken bywomen on the empowerment of women on a holistic level was analyzed along economic,social, political and psychological dimensions. A quasi-experimental design compared themeans of two groups of women: microfinance-backed female entrepreneurs versus non-entrepreneurs for which four hypotheses were posited:

H1. Microfinance-backed entrepreneurship has a positive impact on women’s economicempowerment.

H2. Microfinance-backed entrepreneurship significantly has a positive impact of socialempowerment of women.

H3. Microfinance-backed women entrepreneurship has a positive impact on theirpolitical empowerment.

H4. Microfinance-backed entrepreneurship significantly has a powerful impact onpsychological/personal empowerment of women.

While each of these hypotheses is confirmed, it should be noted that the least powerful impactof microfinance-backed entrepreneurship relates to social empowerment. Comparativelygreater impact in terms of scale was determined to obtain vis-�a-vis the economic andpsychological empowerment of women.

The results nonetheless suggest female entrepreneurship engenders holisticempowerment of women. In the main, women able to utilize microfinance for productiveactivities (micro-entrepreneurship) experience holistic empowerment to an extentsignificantly greater than those who divert financial resources towards alternate purposes.

The holisticempowerment

of women

Despite evidence of asymmetric impact on a dimensional level, microfinance-backedentrepreneurship can accordingly serve as an appropriate tool towards holisticempowerment of women. This major finding clears up fuzziness and inconsistencies in theextant literature on female entrepreneurship and the empowerment of women.

In achieving the goal of holistic women empowerment, effectively and efficiently, at theregional, national as well as global level, female entrepreneurship should be the focus ofpolicy interventions, especially in the form of microfinance programs, subject to continuousmonitoring coupled with the guidance and counseling offered to would-be and extant femaleentrepreneurs. Further, access to microfinance loans on behalf of women to establish theirown business ventures ought to be contingent on their exercise of full control over financialand operational decision-making in their enterprises in view of the goal of fostering theirempowerment as expeditiously as possible.

Limitations and future researchIn conducting this research, two major limiting factors need to be acknowledged: cognitivegaps in data collection and singular geographic context. Employment of semi-structuredinterviews for primary data collection (quantitative approach) was mandated in the face ofthe illiteracy of the vast majority of respondents who accordingly lacked the capacity to readand to respond to the questionnaire themselves. Notwithstanding earnest efforts applied tomake respondents understand all the questions to get valid responses, cognitive gapsbetween the intent of the question and the understanding of the question cannot be ruled outin all cases and individuals chargedwith data collection inevitably evince unevenness in theircapacity to perform this explanatory function. As a result of such asymmetries, not all datacollected can be regarded as uniformly valid The geographical scope of the study is limited toKashmir Valley, India and attempts to draw inferences applied to populations in differentregions can only be done tentatively and circumspectly with keen awareness that alternatecultural contexts may exert a substantial impact on conclusions reached concerning theimpact of female entrepreneurship on holistic empowerment. In sum, immense care needs tobe taken in generalizing the findings of this admittedly parochial study to alternate contexts.Unfortunately, undertaking of a multi-regional sample was beyond the time and financialconstraints of this study.

With the passage of time, microfinance intervention under the “National Rural LivelihoodMission” in India is becoming increasingly mature, so that in the future, more data willbecome available to assess the long-term impact on microfinance on the empowerment ofwoman across all dimensions. In addition, longitudinal studies across regions need to beconducted to ascertain the impact of entrepreneurship on holistic women empowerment onthe national and international levels of analysis.

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Further reading

Safari, K., Njoka, C. and Munkwa, M.G. (2021), “Financial literacy and personal retirement planning: asocioeconomic approach”, Journal of Business and Socio-Economic Development.

About the authorsShagufta Tariq Khan is the corresponding author who currently works at the Department ofAccounting, Jazan University (Saudi Arabia) as an Assistant Professor. She has more than ten researchpapers published in reputed international journals including Scopus indexed and UGC-CARE list. Shehas completed doctorate from the Department of Commerce, University of Kashmir (India) in the area ofAccounting and Finance. She has been performing number of administrative tasks as well viz.coordinator in E-learning, Quality Assurance Unit. She has reviewed number of manuscripts submittedto reputed international journals including Sage and Emerald. She has more than two years of teachingexperience at higher education. Shagufta Tariq Khan is the corresponding author and can be contactedat: Shagaftakhan@gmail.com

Mohd Abass Bhat is presently working as an Assistant Professor at the Department of BusinessStudies, the University of Technology and Applied Sciences, Muscat (Oman). He has published morethan twenty research papers in reputed international journals including Scopus indexed. He has adoctorate degree in Commerce pursued from the Department of Commerce, the University of Kashmir(India) and has more than eight years of teaching experience at higher education. He has reviewednumber of research papers submitted to reputed journals.

Mohi-Ud-Din Sangmi is working as a senior professor in the Department of Commerce and is incharge of a reputed position of Dean, College Development Council, the University of Kashmir, Jammuand Kashmir, India. He previously worked as a Director in UGC—Human Resource Development Centre(HRDC), University of Kashmir, India, Dean Faculty of Commerce and Management Studies, Universityof Kashmir, India and Head, Department of Business and Financial Studies, University of Kashmir,India. He has held positions of Academic Chief Editor and Editor forThe Business Review, Journal of theFaculty of Commerce and Management Studies. He has been honored with International Visitor’sLeadership Programme (IVLP) by US Department of State, Government of USA, Washington, DC, 2006and Bharat Joyti Award by IIFS Delhi, 2010. He has been the member of Chief Minster’s Special TaskForce for Assessment of Industrial policy in the state, Government of Jammu and Kashmir, CivilSecretariat Jammu/Srinagar, 2013–2014 and member of State Audit Advisory Board, with PrincipalAccountant General (J&K) under the auspicious of Comptroller andAuditor General of India, 2010–2012.He has a membership with World Finance (Professors) Association/Conference, Indian AccountingAssociation, Udaipur; Indian Institute of Public Administration, New Delhi and Institute of ObjectiveStudies, New Delhi. His main research interests lie in several key areas: financial inclusion,microinsurance, financial literacy, stock market, corporate governance and derivatives trading.Around 10 candidates successfully completed PhD under his supervision and around 5 candidates arecurrently working under his worthy guidance. He has publishedmore than 70 papers in various journalsand presentedmore than 100 papers in various national and international conferences. He has publishedbooks which include (a) Emerging Dimensions of Business, (edited volume) with N. A. Nazir, New

The holisticempowerment

of women

Century Publications, New Delhi, 2004, (b)Management Control System in Banks, Anmol Publications,New Delhi, 2000, (c) Accountancy: Theory and Practice, Ahmed Publishing House Srinagar, 1994, (d)Modern Book-Keeping andAccounting, Anmol Publications, NewDelhi, 1992. He hasmore than 30 yearsof experience in teaching and research. Furthermore, he has traveled abroad (Washington, Baltimore,California, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, (all USA); Beijing, Shanghai (China); Venice, Rome, Milan(Italy); Lyon, Paris (France); Vatican City (Vatican); Zurich (Switzerland); Frankfurt (Germany); andThimpu and Geddu (Bhutan)) to gain more insights about research.

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